Monday, September 23, 2013

My husband was going through some old document files the other day, and found a funny relic of our family: newborn baby John's photo ID excusing him from mandatory nursery attendance due to being "special needs."

Yes, you read that right. Let me explain:

My husband attended Hyles-Anderson College in NW Indiana from the fall semester of 2003 through November of 2005. During that time, we went to church at First Baptist Church of Hammond, at the time pastored by now disgraced Jack Schaap.

FBC Hammond has a strictly enforced rule of no babies or young children in the auditorium. By strictly enforced, I mean the ushers at each door act as bouncers, and physically stop any parent from bringing young children into the main auditorium. If this policy has changed since then, someone please correct me.

When we first started attending there, Solomon was almost 2 years old, and Isaac was 6 months. While we were not fans of the nursery, we also were not categorically against it. Isaac had enjoyed the old nursery back at our home church, partly due to the fact that Solomon was in there with him. In Hammond, however, nursery was not cozy and sweet as one might imagine - it was baby bootcamp. Crying babies were not tended to, unless the schedule said it was time to feed, diaper, or move them to the swing. In general, emotional needs were a foreign concept, and coddling babies was out of the question.

I could write post after post about how particularly terrible the facilities and staff at the Hammond nurseries were. For starters, the meanest, oldest, most-opposed-to-breastfeeding matrons were put in charge of the youngest babies. For a church with hundreds of babies, there were about one dozen old, dirty metal chairs with arm rests in exactly the wrong positions crammed into the back of a ladies' restroom for nursing moms. Due to the seating shortage, nursing sessions were restricted to 15 minutes per mom/baby. Yet, I don't remember the chairs ever even being maxed out. All the good, responsible mamas dutifully pumped a bottle for church services, so their 2-day old could be left from 9:30 am before Sunday School started, until past noon when the morning service dismissed. Unless, of course, the parents had a bus route to tend to all afternoon, in which case baby was left from before Sunday School, until after the evening service dismissed sometime around 8 pm or later. I actually knew many people who would literally leave their tiny newborn baby in the nursery for that whole entire day, every week. Makes me shudder!!!!

One time, Isaac was about 8 months old, I had the audacity to nurse him twice in the same morning. Once between Sunday School and the morning service, and then again when, on mother's instinct, I returned a few minutes later to check on him and found him wailing miserably, laying alone in a crib, completely ignored. I briefly nursed him again, hoping he would fall asleep. I had to be back in the main auditorium before the preaching started, at which point nobody could come and go any longer. The nursery worker in charge of Isaac that day was a particular piece of work. She made no secret of letting on just how much she despised my permissive parenting of a baby. I hated having to turn Isaac back over to her. He was so tired, but too worked up to relax and go to sleep.

When I returned after the service to get him, I realized that the little number tag that we received in exchange for our child was left in my husband's suit coat pocket. Even though this woman had twice that morning handed Isaac to me to nurse him without requiring the number tag, she was now refusing to hand him to me, just to teach me a lesson. She insisted I must produce the tag to be given my child. She knew who I was, she knew I was the mother, she was just a jerk. Had Isaac been playing happily, maybe I wouldn't have cared, but he was screaming, beet-red, worked up and overtired, back in that same stupid crib, obviously having been ignored for the last 90 minutes. And this woman was refusing to let me have him!!! This is back before everyone had cell phones, so I couldn't just call my husband and ask him to come over with the tag. There was no way I was going to find him in this tangled sea of thousands of people crammed in tiny back hallways. (This was all at the old, overcapacitated church buildings.) We had agreed beforehand to meet at Isaac's nursery after he picked up Solomon from his, so I figured I would just stay put and wait for him to show up. I told the nursery worker I at least wanted to hold my child in the nursery to console him while we waited for the "golden tag," but she would have none of it, claiming my "street shoes" (which she also was wearing) would contaminate their floors. Isaac wasn't even allowed one foot outside the nursery. It took my husband a good quarter hour before he worked his way over there, having had to wait in line for Solomon, etc. The whole while, this monster is holding my screaming baby hostage. My blood still boils just thinking about it.

Even before this, immediately after moving to Hammond, Isaac (who had virtually never cried in his life as he was the mellowest, most content baby we have ever had) started becoming fitful and clingy. Normal at that stage maybe, but greatly exacerbated by the nursery "care." He would start crying anytime he couldn't see me, or if I put him in the car seat. He started being up at night. Both he and Solomon started being sick for months on end - I would miss as many services as I would be able to attend, thanks to all the illnesses being brought home from the oh-so-sterile nursery. Must have been all those street shoes (eye roll).

I felt like I had two kids in day care, and I wasn't even going to any of the many little classes and events they put on for the ladies, which always included nursery care. The pervading notion was that the more often a mother would drop her baby off to "serve God" in some other capacity, the more righteous and godly she was. Wives of full-time college students were allowed so many college credits for free each semester, and there literally were women who would take one 8 o'clock class, just so they could drop their baby off in the nursery, and leave it there until chapel dismissed at 1 pm. This would give them all morning, from 9 am to noon, to be footloose and fancyfree. The cheap nursery laborers were college girls taking the "Christian Wife and Motherhood" degree. So they were not only cheap, they actually PAID college dues to babysit in the nursery.

Needless to say, we realized we had to come up with some other alternative. We resorted to me sitting in the hallway with baby Isaac in my lap, while my husband started smuggling Solomon into the main auditorium. This worked for a while, though I received plenty of dirty looks from ushers walking the hallway.

However, shortly after John was born, the church moved to its new (current) auditorium. This being their Taj Mahal, having anyone sitting in the foyers or hallways with a baby in arms was absolutely no-no, as it ruined the image they were going for. Nevermind the fact that they had sofas everywhere, and I could actually have sat and listened in comfort. We were told the only options for parents were to put the kids in the nursery, or else not to come back to church.

At this time, my husband had finished about half of the required credits for his 4-year degree by taking tons of classes each semester, and doing summer school. Having invested so much time, effort, and money into this Bible college degree, we didn't just want to walk out. But we also were not going to put the kids back into the hands of those nursery dragons.

And this, you see, is where the story all comes together. The beautiful new auditorium had two fully glass-enclosed, sound-proof rooms extending into the main auditorium, designated for the infirm. One of these rooms housed all the insane people they would bring in from various nursing homes (no joke), the other was always empty but allegedly for chronically sick people.

In order to be allowed access to the glass cage, one had to produce a written note from their doctor, stating why and how long they could not be allowed in the general nursery population. Through a series of fortunate events, my chiropractor at the time wrote up a note for John, stating that the rash he was born with on his face and torso might be contagious, and that he was to be kept separate from other children. The people in charge of issuing the cards were suspicious enough to want to consult with a dirty old man at the church, Dr. Creeper Streeter, but thankfully he was unavailable at the time that we were to be seen by him and the card was, after some debate, issued to us without the approval of the holy man in white.

Side note: In all the years at the college, I only attended one class there. It was taught by Dr. Creeper Streeter himself, and open only to the engaged young college ladies getting married at the church in the near future. At the time, I of course was the married mother of three. This secretive meeting aroused enough suspicions in us that we felt it might be interesting for me to sneak in there incognito, wired with a hidden recorder and all. Through dumb luck, I got through the matron nurses checking names at the door. I mean, even the windows had been completely blacked out by heavy fabric.

The meeting was all about graphic sex ed complete with a blown up crotch shot of a naked woman, the good doctor pushing birth control pills and insisting they do not cause silent abortions (the first batch was practically free, and I am sure it had nothing to do with the accompanying pelvic exam he had to perform in order to give them out), and urging young virgins to come see him at his office before their wedding night, as they would not be able to consummate the marriage with their husband if he did not surgically assist in ridding them off their virginity first. As a married woman who had thrice given birth, the graphic and obscene nature of this "class" made me blush and shrink back into my chair. One of these days, I will need to make the tape from that meeting public. This is the same college physician that divorced his wife after getting one of the nurses pregnant, which neither cost him his position nor his clinic at the college.

How did I get off on this tangent? This was the same doctor that was to come and look over my baby John, to see if he was indeed legitimately indisposed of the nursery. We were not going to let the creep anywhere near the baby if it had come to a showdown, but we were glad that the whole thing was averted through an act of God.

Being granted photo ID began a period of time where we could sit, without harassment, and observe the services from the cheese bell known as the West Overflow Room. Besides us, the room was virtually empty. Those cards were hard to get, I'm telling you. Can anyone who goes to church there tell me if they still issue these?

By the end of the next year (November 2005), even though my husband was so close to being done with college (he was slated to graduate at the end of the spring semester in May of 2006), we left the church and the college because it became so overwhelmingly evident that Jack Schaap was a false teacher and a pervert. And he wasn't the only one on staff there. With the blessing of our pastor back in California, we moved to Arizona to start Faithful Word Baptist Church, and the rest is history.

There were good things that came out of going to Bible College in Indiana. One of them being that we went from being somewhat supportive of church nurseries, to being vehemently opposed to them, much to the betterment of children and families in our church and elsewhere.

Thursday, September 19, 2013

Fermented foods and beverages, such as kefir, yogurt, sourdough bread, sauerkraut, kimchi, pickles, etc. are highly probiotic, as well as full of enzymes and vitamins (especially B vitamins). I am working on a separate post explaining in great detail how fermented foods play such a huge role in being healthy. In a nutshell, I would say that adding ferments has been monumental, at least as important and efficient as switching to being all organic, if not even more so.

Kombucha is fermented sweetened black tea. It is incredibly refreshing, healthy, hydrating, naturally fizzy, and very tasty. At least the homemade kind. I have tried one from the store, and while the health benefits are the same, I greatly prefer the taste of my fresh, home-brewed kombucha. It's also much cheaper, plus you can play around with the various teas and flavors.

Inevitably, someone will raise the concern that kombucha (or other fermented foods and drinks) contain alcohol. This is partly true: anytime you have sugars (that's carbs) and yeast present, you have alcohol fermentation. Of course, yeast spores are everywhere, even in the air you are breathing right now. Therefore, wherever you have sugar, you also have trace amounts of alcohol.

There are two ways to ferment something: by yeast, or by bacteria. Yeast fermentation always produces alcohol, whereas bacterial fermentation eats up these sugar alcohols. Since kombucha is made using both yeast and bacteria, the end product will contain only trace amounts of alcohol - less than the browning banana in your fruit bowl, or than what is found on the outside of grapes. At a rate of 1 cup sugar per gallon of tea, the alcohol level in kombucha will remain far below the legally permissible limit of 0.5% alcohol for soft drinks. This is why kombucha is considered a soft drink, and can be bought by anyone of any age. Even regular soft drinks contain about 0.2-0.4% alcohol, kefir about 0.5%, etc. Such small amounts of alcohol do not cause intoxication, because the human body and liver are capable of filtering these naturally occurring alcohols out of the system. Intoxication is a result of pouring in more than the body can process and eliminate - picture a funnel being filled faster in the top, than it can empty out in the bottom.

Ideally, you will be able to obtain a starter culture for free from a friend, or you may want to try your luck with craigslist or freecycle. If not, you can obtain a wonderful, inexpensive, fresh SCOBY starter culture from Azure Standard, or directly from Herbucha.com. I am also a great fan of Cultures for Health, however, their starter culture comes in a dehydrated state and must be rehydrated, an extra step that I would rather skip. They also have a great video on how to make kombucha.

Sexual assault victims’ organizations are slamming evolutionary
biologist and leading atheist Richard Dawkins for comments he made about
the inoffensiveness of “mild pedophilia.”

Dawkins made the remarks in a recent interview with The Times magazine.
He said that during his time at a boarding school as a boy in the
1950s, a teacher “pulled me on his knee and put his hand inside my
shorts.” Dawkins described the incident as “mild pedophilia” that left
him no worse off. Neither Dawkins nor the other boys abused by this
teacher suffered permanent physical or mental damage, he said.

“I don’t think he did any of us lasting harm,” said Dawkins.

Dawkins also said that it was improper to judge the acts committed by this teacher by today’s higher moral standards.

“I am very conscious that you can’t condemn people of an earlier era
by the standards of ours,” he said. “Just as we don’t look back at the
18th and 19th centuries and condemn people for racism in the same way as
we would condemn a modern person for racism, I look back a few decades
to my childhood and see things like caning, like mild pedophilia, and
can’t find it in me to condemn it by the same standards as I or anyone
would today.”

His perspective on sexual assault drew strong criticism from numerous
victims’ rights organizations, including Peter Watt, director of child
protection at the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to
Children.

“Mr. Dawkins seems to think that because a crime was committed a long
time ago we should judge it in a different way,” said Watt, according to The Washington Post. “But we know that the victims of sexual abuse suffer the same effects whether it was 50 years ago or yesterday.”

No lasting harm? Is that why he turned out to be a rabid, God-hating atheist bent on convincing others to reject God?

And none of the others boys suffered lasting harm, either? How does he know? Does he know every victim? Has he followed all of them for the last 5 decades?

Today's higher moral standards? And his example is racism? Because being a racist is so much worse than openly embracing sodomy like our society today does.

Clearly, Dawkins is just going mild on his own depravity. After reading this, I have zero doubt that he himself is a pedophile. Openly accepting him and his like is next on the agenda of perverting humanity.

Friday, September 6, 2013

Here are a glimpse at this year's lesson plans, laid out by week. Basically, there is one line per child, color-coded, which tells them where they should be at in each subject by the end of the week. Solomon: green (8th grade), Isaac: orange (6th grade), John: yellow (4th grade), Miriam: pink (2nd grade), Becky: purple (1st grade). Subjects that we work on together are shown in white across the respective rows of those children.

Bible Reading and Memory

Math

Reading

Writing

Spelling

Grammar/ Comp.

Science/ Social Studies

Other
daily subjects

Other weekly subjects

Week 1

Aug. 26

–

Aug. 31

8/27 First Day of School

4 chapters per day

Psalm 31

Saxon Math Algebra II,

lessons 1-3

non-fiction reading pertaining to
weekly topic

1 page per day in Pentime 8

--

LLATL

Lesson 1

Abeka Science 8: lessons 1-5

German

S:

I:

J:

Piano Practice

S:

I:

J:

M:

Typing

S:

I:

J:

M:

Story time

related art/craft:

7-day creation collage

related meal:

fruit salad

related activity: write to Dr.
Hovind

field trip:

AZSC class

ASL

P.E.

piano lesson

Great Science Adventures: Earth’s
Landforms

ATTA: Creation to Flood

7 days of creation, Young Earth

astronomy

heliocentricity vs. geocentricity

daily portion

Psalm 31

Saxon Math 87,

lessons A-3

non-fiction reading pertaining to
weekly topic

1 page per day in Pentime 6

R&S, grade 6, Lesson 1

LLATL through p. 10

daily NT portion

Psalm 31

Harcourt Math 4 chapter 1 (up to
p. 15)

non-fiction reading pertaining to
weekly topic

1 page per day in Pentime 4

R&S, grade 4, Lesson 1

LLATL Book Study A (through p.11)

Bible time with Mom

Harcourt Math 2 through p. I

Handbook for Reading,

Learning Letter Sounds

1 page per day in Pentime 1B

R&S, grade 2, Lesson 1

LLATL Red Book

R&S I and J workbooks

Harcourt Math 1 through p. I

Handbook for Reading,

Learning Letter Sounds

1 page per day in Pentime 1 A

LLATL Blue Book

R&S D-J workbooks

Week 2

Sept. 2

–

Sept. 7

9/2 Labor Day

4 chapters per day

Psalm 31

Saxon Math Algebra II,

lessons 4-6, Test 1

non-fiction reading pertaining to
weekly topic

1 page per day in Pentime 8

--

LLATL

Lesson 2

Abeka Science 8:lessons 6-10

German

S:

I:

J:

Piano Practice

S:

I:

J:

M:

Typing

S:

I:

J:

M:

Story time

related art/craft:

learn to draw animals

related meal:

fig bars

related activity: sleep in a tent

field trip:

BBQ and apple/pear picking at
Date Creek Ranch

ASL

P.E.

piano lesson

Great Science Adventures: Earth’s
Landforms

ATTA: Creation to Flood

Truth about “human ancestors”

harp, organ

iron, brass

cattle, trees

dwellings: tents

daily portion

Psalm 31

Saxon Math 87,

lessons 4-8

non-fiction reading pertaining to
weekly topic

1 page per day in Pentime 6

R&S, grade 6, Lesson 2

LLATL through p. 18

daily NT portion

Psalm 31

Harcourt Math 4 chapter 2 (up to
p. 31)

non-fiction reading pertaining to
weekly topic

1 page per day in Pentime 4

R&S, grade 4, Lesson 2

LLATL Lesson 1 (through p.20)

Bible time with Mom

Harcourt Math 2 through p. 12

Handbook for Reading,

Learning Letter Sounds

1 page per day in Pentime 1B

R&S, grade 2, Lesson 2

LLATL Red Book

R&S I and J workbooks

Harcourt Math 1 through p. 12

Handbook for Reading,

Learning Letter Sounds

1 page per day in Pentime 1 A

LLATL Blue Book

R&S D-J workbooks

The daily subjects have room to allow for check marks behind each name. When we are done with a certain subject for the week, that box gets crossed out.

We have used this system for several years, and it works well for us. It gives structure and guidance, keeping everyone on track, without being overly detailed. It's simple enough for the kids to read themselves, yet keeps them accountable.

Wednesday, September 4, 2013

We had a wedding at our church this past Saturday. As he always does, my husband preached a short sermon related to marriage. I am sharing it here because I really liked it. This is the seventh wedding my husband has officiated in as many years of pastoring.

This is the second wedding that Solomon has played the piano part in. He was nervous and excited, but did great.

There is a delay when the ring bearer is supposed to be coming down the aisle. The little boy, for reasons known only to him, froze about half-way down the aisle and would not budge. The best man walked up to encourage him to go on, but when that didn't work, he simply threw him over his shoulder and carried him the rest of the way. It was pretty cute and funny in real life. Only four years old, and already dragged down the aisle!

Every child's favorite part seemed to be the easily accessible spout of the punch bowl...

We get the tables for the reception ready ahead of time, and just quickly transform the auditorium once the ceremony is over.

The table of the wedding party

She got him... kinda, sort of, a little bit... :)

Weddings are so much fun! I saw a comment somewhere, along the lines of "There are three kinds of rings: the engagement ring, the wedding ring, and the suffering." Clearly, whoever came up with that is failing as a spouse. What an insulting thing to say when you are married, and if you are single - well, your attitude explains why!

Whoso findeth a wife findeth a good thing, and obtaineth favour of the LORD. - Proverbs 18:22

HSLDA Founder and Chairman Mike Farris meets with the Wunderlich family
during the Global Home Education Conference held in Berlin, Germany in
October 2012.

Children Seized in Shocking Raid

At 8:00 a.m. on Thursday, August 29, 2013, in what has been called a
“brutal and vicious act,” a team of 20 social workers, police officers,
and special agents stormed a homeschooling family’s residence near
Darmstadt, Germany, forcibly removing all four of the family’s children
(ages 7-14). The sole grounds for removal were that the parents, Dirk
and Petra Wunderlich, continued to homeschool their children in defiance
of a German ban on home education.

The children were taken to unknown locations. Officials ominously
promised the parents that they would not be seeing their children
“anytime soon.”

HSLDA obtained and translated the court documents that authorized
this use of force to seize the children. The only legal grounds for
removal were the family’s continuation of homeschooling their children.
The papers contain no other allegations of abuse or neglect. Moreover,
Germany has not even alleged educational neglect for failing to provide
an adequate education. The law ignores the educational progress of the
child; attendance—and not learning—is the object of the German law.

Judge Koenig, a Darmstadt family court judge, signed the order on
August 28 authorizing the immediate seizure of Dirk and Petra
Wunderlich’s children. Citing the parents’ failure to cooperate “with
the authorities to send the children to school,” the judge also
authorized the use of force “against the children” if necessary,
reasoning that such force might be required because the children had
“adopted the parents’ opinions” regarding homeschooling and that “no
cooperation could be expected” from either the parents or the children.

State Custody

In October 2012, state youth officials had been granted formal legal
custody of the Wunderlich children by a German court based solely on the
fact that the family was homeschooling. German lawyer Andreas Vogt
sought appellate relief on behalf of the Wunderlichs and was able to
forestall immediate removal of the children. But, yesterday, as the
family quietly began their homeschool day, a ringing at the door
signaled the interruption that turned their lives upside down.

Dirk Wunderlich described the frightening turn of events.

“I looked through a window and saw many people, police, and special
agents, all armed. They told me they wanted to come in to speak with me.
I tried to ask questions, but within seconds, three police officers
brought a battering ram and were about to break the door in, so I opened
it,” he told HSLDA.

“The police shoved me into a chair and wouldn’t let me even make a
phone call at first,” he said. “It was chaotic as they told me they had
an order to take the children. At my slightest movement the agents would
grab me, as if I were a terrorist. You would never expect anything like
this to happen in our calm, peaceful village. It was like a scene out
of a science fiction movie. Our neighbors and children have been
traumatized by this invasion.”

Looking for a Home

Over the past four years, HSLDA has reported on the Wunderlichs’ saga
as they have moved from country to country in the European Union
looking for a place to call home where they could freely homeschool
their children. Although they found refuge from homeschool persecution,
Mr. Wunderlich was unable to find work, and last year the family had to
return to Germany.

The family resettled near Darmstadt, just 25 miles south of
Frankfurt, with some trepidation. It is mandatory that all residents of
Germany register with their local municipal authorities. Within days
of the family registering their presence in the town, authorities
initiated a criminal truancy case, and just months later the “Youth
Welfare Office” was granted legal custody of the children. However, the
court left the children in the residence with the parents since they
were being well treated and otherwise cared for by their parents (see
also: “Come Peacefully Now or by Force Later”).

Authorities even took the children’s passports, making it impossible
for the family to escape—a violation of a number of human rights
guaranteed to them by the European Convention of Human Rights, said
HSLDA Chairman and Founder Michael Farris.

“The right to homeschool is a human right,” said Farris. “So is the
right to freely move and to leave a country. Germany has grossly
violated these rights of this family. This latest act of seizing these
four beautiful, innocent children is an outrageous act of a rogue
nation.”The right of parents to decide how children are educated is a human right of the highest order, said Farris.

“The United States Constitution is not alone in upholding the right
of parents to decide how to educate their children. Germany is a party
to numerous human rights treaties that recognize the right of parents to
provide an education distinct from the public schools that so that
children may be educated according to the parents’ religious
convictions. Germany has simply not met its obligations under these
treaties or as a liberal democracy,” Farris said. “HSLDA and I will do
whatever we can to help this family regain custody of their children and
ensure that they are safe from this persecution. This case demonstrates
conclusively why the Romeike asylum case is so important. Families in
Germany need a safe place where they can educate their children in
peace.”

“Devastated”

Following the raid, Dirk Wunderlich told HSLDA Director for
International Affairs Mike Donnelly that he and his wife were
devastated.

“These are broken people,” Donnelly said. “They said they felt like
they were being ground into dust. They were shaken to their core and
shocked by the event. But they also told me that they had followed their
conscience and the dictates of their faith. Although they don’t have
much faith in the German state—they have a lot of faith in God. They are
an inspiring and courageous family.”

“I’ve been fighting for German homeschool freedom for years,” he
continued, “and I had hoped that things were changing in Germany since
it has been some time since brutality of this magnitude has occurred.
But I was wrong.”

“Mike Farris and I spent time with the Wunderlichs at the first
global homeschool conference in Berlin in November 2012,” Donnelly went
on to say. “They are a delightful family with precious children. They
are really just regular people who are doing what millions of people
here in the United States do every day.”

“How Long?”

“My question to the political leadership of Germany is: How long will
you permit these kinds of brutal acts to be perpetrated against German
families?” said Donnelly. “Why is it so important to you to force people
into your state schools? The echo of this act rings from a darker time
in German history. When will leaders stand up and make changes so that
brutality to children like the Wunderlichs no longer happens because of
homeschooling? Isn’t there any German statesman willing to stand up for
what is right anywhere in Germany?”

Wunderlich said that his 14-year-old daughter Machsejah had to be forcibly taken out of the home.

“When I went outside, our neighbor was crying as she watched. I
turned around to see my daughter being escorted as if she were a
criminal by two big policemen. They weren’t being nice at all. When my
wife tried to give my daughter a kiss and a hug goodbye, one of the
special agents roughly elbowed her out of the way and said—‘It’s too
late for that.’ What kind of government acts like this?”

After the children were taken away, the family was “invited” to a
meeting with the senior social authority in charge at the scene, Mr.
Behnis. The Wunderlichs agreed to the meeting and were joined by their
attorney, Andreas Vogt, who came as soon as he was notified, traveling
hours by train.

When the parents asked when they could seek a hearing to contest the
seizure of their children, they were told they would have to wait until
the regular judge returned from vacation. Vogt told HSLDA that the
authorities had displayed little sympathy. Vogt has become a key lawyer
in the German homeschool movement, representing many active cases. He
has taken some to the German Supreme Court with no success to date.

Petra Wunderlich said her heart was shattered.

“We are empty. We need help. We are fighting, but we need help,” she said.

If you are as outraged about this as I am (and you should be), the HSLDA offers the following contact information:

Contact German Officials

Talking points:

You are shocked and dismayed at the German actions in sending a SWAT team to remove the Wunderlich children.

A UN rapporteur has criticized Germany for its harsh treatment of homeschoolers in his 2006 report on the German education system (see paragraphs 62 and 93 (g) of the report).

Germany authorities should immediately release the Wunderlich children to their parents.

Germany should promptly change its law to permit homeschooling to comply with its obligations under international law.

German Embassy in Washington, D.C.
(202) 298-4000Online contact formIf you receive an error message in Google Chrome, please try a different browser.

Like you, my time is very limited and valuable, yet I have, and will continue to, beat down the doors of the above contacts. Don't be afraid to call the above offices in Germany - they all are supposed to speak English, or at least understand what you are saying. If you use Skype to call the land lines, your call will cost very little (2.3 cents per minute). Depending on where you live, there is a 7-9 hour time change between the US and Germany. You can search "local time in Germany" on Google to find out what time it is there. The above offices will be open only during typical business hours, roughly 8 am to 3 pm local time. In Arizona (MST), that is between our hours of 11 pm and 6 am.

You could get your children involved, and teach them a very important civics lesson.

I would like to ask any and all of my friends and family in Germany, that are reading this, to likewise contact the above officials. Whether or not you personally homeschool, which would be against the Hitler-era laws still in effect, does not determine whether it is right to forcibly remove children who are well cared for and educated, simply because they refuse to be a part of the German brainwashing institutions known as public schools, the ONLY school option available in Germany (every private school must still accept and abide by state-wide and federal public school standards).

Germany's violation of human rights is not only shameful and embarrassing, but downright criminal. This is a disgrace to anyone of German nationality, myself included, and should swiftly be repealed.

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Solomon (17)

Typical firstborn. Very intelligent and logical. Loves to talk. Likes for things to be "right" and organized. Very honest and fair. Exceptional musical talent. Great helper with younger siblings. Very kind and loving.

Isaac (16)

Loves anything to do with being outdoors: riding bikes, hiking, camping, caring for animals, exploring, horseback riding, etc. Very reliable and polite. My "Mr. Fix-It" man. Never ever complains. Tough, but has a very tender heart. Devours books at incredible speed.

John (14)

Our quirky child. Funny and artistic. Precocious and empathetic. Loving older brother to his younger siblings. A bit of daredevil.

Miriam (12)

Beautiful and sweet. Kind and mothering with her younger siblings. Loves being by my side 24/7. My big helper. Has a great sense of style.

Rebecca (10)

Full of energy. Smart and mischievous in a very loveable way. Very tidy. Loves to help with anything she can. Dotes on her younger siblings. Daddy's girl, bookworm.

Anna (8)

Sweet girly girl. Loves pretend playing with her siblings and her dollies. Wants to be a big girl like her sisters. Tenderhearted.

Stephen (6)

Full of energy. Loves to climb onto anything. Wild and rambunctious. All boy, and always happy. A smaller version of his dad, with whom he shares his name and birthday.

Boaz (4)

This little guy is an extra special blessing after a complicated twin pregnancy. Mellow and easy-going. Chatterbox. Smart cookie with a heart of gold.

Chloe (2)

A precious little doll that brightens all of our lives. Smiles, coos, gives kisses, and brings joy every day.

Peter (1)

The newest addition to our family. A sweet little guy that brings us much joy.